



















I 


* ^ ^ . 


j 


* * 



» 

■V 






t 

t 




K 


• « 


O'' 


# 


f 


f 








> 


« 


» 














I 

. 


r 


k 

« 





I 


-» t f 



I < 



< t 







« 


'I ' 



' • 


1 • 






k 


/ 


# 



t 




CHRISTMAS 


AT 


TAPPAN SEA. 







r ’ ^ • 


^ . -■ 




•fW' 


‘ M 

4 , ♦ 


I 




1 






4 . it 


<« ’ I a ■ 





IBU) li 






U I Bai 



“Then with a stiff-jointed effort.’' 





CHRISTMAS 

AT 

TAPPAN 

BY 

MARY CAROLINE HYDE, 

I 1 

AUTHOR OF 

“goostie” and “under the stable floor.” 


SEA. 

/ 


BOSTON : 

LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. 



^ OCT 17 1899 



\ 

'V 



43717 

Copyright, 1895, 

By Roberts Brothers. 

Copyright, 1899, 

By Little, Brown, and Company. 

A It rights reserved. 


TWO COPIES RECEIVED, 



lECOND corr, 


John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, U.S.A. 






LESLEY GREEN SHEAFER. 










Christmas at Tappan Sea. 


Here were records of old times . . . and here 
they have been miraculously preserved by Saint 
Nicholas. — Irving, Wolferfs Roost. 

I. 

was a July afternoon in that part 
of 1700 that touched within a few 
years of our own century. Bees, butter- 
flies, and a humming-bird or two honey- 
hunted in the vines which hung about 
the little Dutch panes of the kitchen 
window near which Nochie sat all 
alone, trying to knit ; but stitches 
would drop, her hands grew sticky 


8 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

and warm, and she drew a sigh so 
deep that it wrinkled her stomacher as 
she counted and found her stint but 
half done. 

The outside of one window-pane was 
so covered with green leaves that it 
made a looking-glass, which reflected 
the edge of the small round quilted 
cap, set on the crown of her yellow 
thatched head, her plump face, her 
rosy cheeks, big blue eyes, and the 
frown which drew down the corners 
of her red lips till they disappeared 
under her chin. 

“Oh, dear Saint Nicholas !” she said, 
for she had a quaint habit of so talk- 
ing to the patron saint of her people, 
“ why do little girls have to knit and 
knit, when they want to be bumbling 
out-doors among the flowers, just like 
the butterflies and things t ” 


9 


Christmas at Tappaji Sea. 

An outside door had opened, and a 
strong, handsome man strode across 
the clean sanded kitclien-floor to the 
fireplace, above which he reached, and 
took down from a row of hooks a 
gun so wonderful that he could kill 
a wild goose with it if the goose were 
half-way across the Tappan Sea; for 
this was Jacob Van Tassel, the most 
persistent and daring of all those who 
opposed the Tory freebooters along 
the Hudson, and the gun his “ great 
goose-gun,” which became so renowned 
in these skirmishes. 

Ask Saint Nicholas to take good 
care of us, too, Nochie,” he said, hav- 
ing caught a few of her words ; “ there 
may come a time when you will be 
glad to be in-doors knitting.” 

Nochie looked up quickly. Never 
had she seen her fathers face so pale, 


lo Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

nor heard his words hint so strongly 
of alarm. 

“ Wait, father,” she said ; “ I will go 
and tell mother you are going out 
with the great goose-gun.” 

“ No, no, child,” he answered ; “ don’t 
worry the mother. I shall be back as 
soon as I can, my butter-ball;” and 
brushing the back of his hand across 
her rosy cheek in a sort of jocose 
tenderness, he shouldered his gun, and 
hurried away to fire in ambush upon 
a British transport so run to ground 
upon the shore of that broad part of 
the Hudson then known as the Tap- 
pan Sea, that its stern swung landward 
within point-blank shot. 

“ Bang!” Nochie heard. 

She shuddered, and dropped her knit- 
ting-needles just as her mother came 
into the room ; then ran to her, and 
clung to her voluminous skirts. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 1 1 

“ Nochie, how silly you be acting ! ” 
said her mother ; “ what be the matter ? ” 

“ I wish Yan were here,” Nochie cried, 
trembling. “ Yan be never afraid.” 

The mother looked above the fire- 
place, and saw that the great goose- 
gun was off the hooks ! There was 
more “bang! bang 1 ” and, like Nochie, 
she shuddered as she heard it. Peer- 
ing through the small paned windows 
toward the east and west, she caught 
glimpses of other bush-fighters, many 
of them the young farmers of the 
region, hurrying up the hill to assist 
her husband in his attack. 

“ I wish Jacob were not so ready to 
fight these Tory boats,” she said to 
the Widow Van Wurmer, who had just 
joined them in the kitchen ; “ it will 
be the worse for him some day.” 

“ Oh, Jacob be one born to good 


12 


Christmas at Tapp an Sea. • 

luck,” responded Widow Van Wurmer, 
who was Nochie’s aunt, and an impor- 
tant part of the household. “ I don’t 
blame him for fighting the rogues ; I 
would do it myself, if I had to.” 

“Bang! bang! bang!” More shots 
were heard; and Yan, whose father 
kept the “ King George ” inn, a mile 
away, came running in, his eyes bright 
with excitement. 

“ Nochie, Vrouw Van Tassel!” he 
cried ; “they’ve peppered that old Tory 
transport, — they ’ve peppered it so good 
that she had no chance to fight back 
again, and she has to go away as fast 
as she can, with no chance to land a 
boat. That ’s the sort of stuff Whigs 
be; my father says he’ll have no more 
King Georges on his tavern.” 

“ Be we Whigs or Tories, mother?” 
Nochie asked. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 13 

“ Whigs, child,” the Widow Van Wur- 
mer answered for the mother. 

“ And what be Whigs ” 

“ Those who be for our country 
instead of King George,” her Aunt 
Van Wurmer still replied. 

“ King George } ” Nochie echoed, look- 
ing across at Yan ; “ that ’s the name to 
be taken away from your tavern.” 

“Hush, Nochie!” said her mother; 
“ children should be seen and not 
heard. Who’s coming ” and she 
looked anxiously toward the back- 
door, as it opened, and Jacob Van 
Tassel entered, followed by a dozen 
sturdy men, all carrying guns, but 
none so large as the great goose-gun. 

Nochie ran toward him, her face 
alight to see him. He stood his gun 
against the wall, and, catching her up, 
tossed her on to his broad shoulder. 


14 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

“ Katrina,” he called to his wife, 
“supper for a dozen. We have done 
good work, and drave the beggars off 
the coast, with as many holes in their 
craft as has your best flour-shaker. The 
great goose-gun never scattered a big- 
ger lot of geese ; ” and he laughed 
heartily. 

“ Did n’t it miss them once, father ” 
asked Nochie, with big eyes. 

“ Not by a long shot,” he said, put- 
ting her down ; “ and near as much 
might be said for the others. Tell the 
mother we ’ll have out the best pewter 
plates, and some fresh olykocks for our 
jubilee party.” 

In a moment Nochie had become a 
helpful little housemaid. She assisted 
Dinah to spread the homespun table- 
cloth and to lay the bright pewter 
plates. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 15 

“You are to stay too, Yan, mother 
says, and afterwards you and I shall 
have the little Delft plates, with some 
olykocks and preserved ginger, all for 
ourselves.” 


II. 


JT was at sunrise, a week later. A 
severe thunder-storm during the 
night had lashed even the placid 
waters of the Tappan Sea into foam- 
trimmed breakers and ruffled waves, 
with their backs well up. Now the 
storm-beaten water swish-swashed upon 
the shore, as if it were anxious to 
roll farther inland, and meet Nochie 
and Yan, who ran toward it from the 
slope above. 

“ Oh, Yan,” said Nochie, stopping, 
quite out of breath, “ the water be 
awfully wild to get to us ; I believe 
it wants to tell us it has drownded 
somebody.” 

“No, it doesn’t,” said Yan; “it be 
often this way after a storm. Soon it 


7 


Christmas .at Tappan Sea. i 

will all smooth out again, and show 
back the sky, the trees, and the rocks, 
like the bottom of a new tin pan.”' 

Nochie was not paying much atten- 
tion to her little friend s remark. Her 
big blue eyes were expanding to twice 
their natural size, and now she caught 
his hand. 

“Oh, Yan, look!” she exclaimed; 
“the Tappan Sea has drownded some 
one, don’t you see, — right over there 
by that big rock ? ” 

Yan shaded his eyes with his brown 
hands, and looked in the direction 
Nochie had pointed out. 

“ By the good Saint Nicholas, it has ! ” 
he cried. “Come on, Nochie, let’s see 
who it be ; maybe it be one of those 
old Tories the great goose-gun was 
after the other day ; ” and catching her 
by the hand, they scampered along the 


1 8 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

narrow strip of beach to the rock 
Nochie had pointed out, only stopping 
their run when it brought them to the 
supposed drowned body lying face 
down upon the sand. 

“ It be a negro ! ” exclaimed Nochie. 

“It be n’t dead !” exclaimed Yan, in 
his turn. “ I saw its hand move. Sheer 
away, Nochie, till I question who it 
be.” 

Nochie withdrew a yard or two, while 
Yan asked, “ Who be you ” 

There was no reply. 

“I say' who be you ” called Yan, 
giving this human piece of wreckage 
a poke with a stick he had picked up. 

“ Don’t, Yan,” cried Nochie ; “ you ’ll 
hurt it. Let me talk to it. Please, Myn- 
heer drownded man, who be you } ” and 
coming closer, she put her lips down 
almost to the man’s ear. 


Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 19 

There was a long groan, suggestive 
of some one awaking from a heavy 
sleep ; then with a stiff-jointed effort 
the man raised himself on one elbow, 
and opened his eyes. 

“ I be shipwrecked, little Missie,” he 
said slowly. “ Pore ole Pompey done 
gone an’ be shipwreck nigh on to def; 
pore ole Pompey, to get drownded like 
dis ! ” 

“ Oh, he be awful drown^i^^ to 
talk like that!” said Yan, shrugging 
his shoulders. 

“ Not awful, but a good deal, Yan, 
more than you’d like to be,” responded 
Nochie ; then, with a sudden assump- 
tion of matronliness, she added, “ We 
must take him home for some dry 
clothes.” 

“ Yes, do, little Missie, please,” said 
Pompey, now sitting erect. “ Dat was 
bery bad storm ; it broke ole Pompey ’s 


20 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 


boat, it banged ole Pompey’s head, 
till Pompey tinked he was dead for 
shoar.” 

“For shore? I guess so,” said Yan, 
dryly. “ See if you can stand up, and 
Nochie and I will take you liome.” 

“ Tank you, sah,” said Pompey, 
scrambling to his feet very actively 
for one so badly drowned, and shak- 
ing the water from his clothes like a 
big Newfoundland dog after a dive, — 
“ tank you, sah.” 

A scowl crept into Van’s face; he 
drew Nochie one side. 

“ What be it ? ” she questioned, lower- 
ing her voice. 

“He be too polite with his ‘little 
Missies ’ and ‘ thank you, sahs,’ ” whis- 
pered Yan. “ 1 mistrust he be an 
English lackey, sent here as a spy. 
Maybe we had better leave him where 
we find him.’' 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 21 

“What!” Nochie exclaimed, “leave 
even a spy to lie in the sand like an 
old salmon ! I ’m s’prised of you, Yan.” 

“ But it might be dangerous to take 
him with us, these times,” still argued 
Yan. 

“Well, haven’t we the great goose- 
gun?” asked Nochie, valiantly, “and 
everybody will be watching him.” 

“So they will,” said Yan, his face 
clearing; “ and what be one old man 
like him to all us Nederlanders ? ” 

“ That be what I think,” nodded 
Nochie ; and as if the question were 
settled forever, they returned to their 
“drownded man.” 

“You was talking ’bout Pompey,” 
he said, as they came up to him ; “ but 
an ole man like Pompey ain’t no 
harm to no one, you need n’t be 
feared.” 


2 2 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

Van’s face colored. 

“ Feared 't ” he repeated ; “ ’deed, No- 
chie and I be not afeared, even of 
Injuns, and I can fire a gun.” 

“ Dat ’s good, dat ’s good,” affirmed 
Pompey, his teeth chattering as he 
staggered, for he was really a good 
deal the worse for his long swim in 
the rough water after it had sunk his 
boat with a sudden leakage. 

Nochie and Van, their qualms of 
distrust disappearing, took each a hand 
of the old man, and led him up the 
river-path toward their homes. 


III. 


pOMPEY was well out of breath 
when the children had helped 
him to reach the top of the land-rise 
on which they lived ; but his steps quick- 
ened perceptibly when his eyes were 
confronted by the very commodious 
public-house which was Van’s home. 

“An’ where does little Missie live.'^” 
he asked, as if he already knew that 
the inn was Van’s home. 

Nochie waved her hand toward a 
comfortable early-Dutch mansion fin- 
ished with crow-step gables of yellow 
brick, surmounted by tin weathercocks 
which threw back the sun so brightly 
in the clear morning air that one 
scarcely realized they were nearly a 
mile away. 


24 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

“ So far as dat ? ” he asked in answer 
to her gesture. 

“ There be a short cut across fields,” 
said Yan. 

“Yes, yes,” he said, now fixing his 
eyes on Oloffe Kieft, Yan’s father, 
seated upon the long porch across the 
front of the inn, and smoking the typi- 
cal Dutch pipe. 

He was clad in very full knicker- 
bockers, a linsey-woolsey coat decorated 
with large brass buttons, and a low- 
crowned, broad-brimmed hat was set 
back on his head, shading as it were 
his fine queue plaited with eel-skin. 

As he saw Nochie and Yan approach- 
ing with Pompey so carefully in tow, he 
recrossed his knees, and took his long- 
stemmed pipe from his mouth in slow 
astonishment. 

Yan waved his hand, to assure his 


Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 25 

father it was all right, and called, 
“Shall I bring him up, father?” 

“ Yes, my boy.” 

“ And you will not call me a cabbage 
head once ? ” 

“ No.” 

Yan was reassured. 

“ You see, Nochie,” he said, turning 
to her, “ I think we had better have 
him ; father is willing. You have Dinah, 
and he would have to go near a mile 
farther to your house.” 

“ Hurry, Yan, you whipster!” called 
his father. “ Hurry ” was a word he 
seldom used. 

Nochie released Pompey’s hand. 
Mynheer Kieft had advanced to his 
porch railing, over which he leaned, 
pipe in hand. 

“ The little Nochie shall come too,” 
he called. 


26 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

Nochie hung her head shyly; for 
already people were gathering upon 
the little street and tavern porch, to 
see whom the children had in hand. 

“Well, Nochie Van Tassel,” laughed 
Van’s father, returning to his seat on 
the bench, and now talking with his 
pipe between his lips ; “ you and whip- 
ster Van have found a precious piece 
of driftwood after the storm.” 

The children were mounting the 
tavern steps, and now, in a line 
with Pompey, seemed waiting to ex- 
plain the old colored man’s presence. 
Shrewdly enough, Oloffe Kieft had 
already guessed how they had come 
upon him. 

“ I think he ’ll be real good and 
help, if you let him stay,” ventured 
Nochie, in behalf of protege \ “per- 
haps he be hungry now and thirsty.” 


Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 27 

Pompey gave her a grateful look, 
and the on-lookers laughed. 

“ Ah, to be sure,” said Oloffe, “ bring 
him a swallow or two of Hollands, till 
we find what he can say for himself.’ 

It was brought at once, and Pompey 
gulped it down with a finishing smack 
that told it had gone to the right spot. 

“ Now tell us who you be, where 
you come from, and why you be here } ” 
Van’s father questioned. 

“ I be Pompey, sah, ’thout no front 
or back name. I hab fished fur cle 
last two year off Gibbet Island, when 
de storm drave my boat las’ night like 
it had to do just as it said, and wid 
such a spite dat it broke it all to 
splinters, and throwed me head fust 
on de Tappan shore, down dere ; ” and 
Pompey pointed with his thumb over 
his shoulder, so that there should be 
no mistake about the locality. 


28 Christmas at Tappafi Sea. 

“You don’t belong to any Tory 
party who have sent you out to spy 
on us ? ” 

“ No, sahP answered Pompey. 

“ And you ’ll not play us any tricks ? ” 

“ No, sah, — no, sahP 

“ All right, then, Pompey, you may 
stay,” said Mynheer Kieft, waving his 
pipe toward him. “ I need a man to 
work about the inn.” 

Pompey’s face glistened. 

“ Dah be one ting I wish to say, sah,” 
he began modestly. 

The audience were all attention. 

“ It be dat dare ain’t no better Whig 
in dis ’ere settlement dan ole Pompey ; 
he was n’t brung from ole England 
to be a Englishman when he be liv- 
ing in America, an’ he don’t forget 
kindnesses.” 

Yan pulled Nochie’s sleeve. “ He be 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 29 

a sound Whig; I be glad we brought 
him,” he said. 

“ So be I.” responded Nochie, in a 
tone of deep satisfaction. 

The group about Pompey scattered 
as Jacob Van Tassel pushed his way 
among them, and laid his hand on 
Nochie’s shoulder. 

“Nochie child, go home,” he said; 
“your mother and Dinah be searching 
the house from garret to cellar for you.” 

Nochie put her plump hand into her 
father’s. 

“ Come with me, father, and tell 
mother and Aunt Nochie, else I shall 
have to knit all the afternoon, — it be 
no harm, be it } ” she said. 

“ What ? ” he asked gruffly. 

“ To have brought Pompey here from 
the Tappan beach? ” 

That be as it turns out, butterball,” 


30 Christmas at Tappaji Sea. 

he said more gently ; and taking her in 
his strong arms, he swung her over the 
porch rail to the ground below, and 
watched her as she ran home whisper- 
ing to herself, — 

“ I will ask Saint Nicholas to make it 
no harm.” 

At the gate both Nochie’s mother 
and her father’s sister, Nochie Van 
Wurmer, for whom she was named, 
were awaiting her, having seen her 
coming rapidly along the open road. 

“ Where have you been all this time 
since breakfast ? ” they asked at the same 
instant. 

Nochie twisted her fingers, and re- 
treated farther under her little round 
quilted cap. 

“ To the Tappan with Yan,” she 
answered. “ After a storm it sometimes 
washes pretty things ashore, mother; 
and Yan and I went to look for them.” 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 31 

“I warrant, ” said Aunt Nochie. “Well, 
what pretty thing did you and Yan find 
to pay your mother for this worry ? ” 

A glimpse of humor flashed into 
Nochie’s blue eyes, as she demurely 
replied, “ A nice, old, most drownded 
negro named Pompey.” 

Both mother and aunt recoiled, while 
Dinah, who had caught the word “ Pom- 
pey,” came forward with hands upraised 
and rolling eyes. 

“ Pompey, Pompey,” she muttered ; 
“ dat am a good name, — de best, next 
to Dinah, dat we colored peoples 
have.” 

“ Tell us the rest, child,” said Nochie’s 
aunt, impatiently ; “ what became of 
him.^^” 

“Why, Yan and I brought him up 
the steep bank home, and now he be 
at the King George, talking with Myn- 


32 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

heer Oloffe Kieft, who told him he 
might stay there.” 

“ Oloffe Kieft should be more 
cautious these times,” said Widow Van 
Wurmer, shortly. 

“ And children too,” said Vrouw Van 
Tassel, taking Nochie’s hand with a firm 
grip. 

“Why, mother,” said Nochie, looking 
up into her mother’s face, “ he be a 
Whig all sound enough, ’cause he was 
telling Mynheer Oloffe Kieft and Yan, 
after he had had the Hollands, that 
he would soon have the King George 
sign down for them, for he be awful 
tall to reach, taller than father, and 
most as strong, I guess, when he be n’t 
drownded.” 

The Widow Van Wurmer shook 
her head, but Vrouw Van Tassel’s 
face cleared and softened, and she 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 33 

said, “Come, Nochie, there be a bowl 
of bread and milk and cheese wait- 
ing for you in the kitchen.” 

“ And shall I have to knit fifty 
rounds ? ” Nochie asked, holding to her 
mother. 

“ Thirty will do,” she answered, con- 
scious that Widow Van Wurmer’s eyes 
were fixed upon her to see that justice 
was done, “ if you will promise never 
again to go to the edge of ihe Tappan 
Sea without asking me.^ ” 

“Not even with Yan ?” questioned 
Nochie, as they went into the kitchen. 

“ No, not even with Yan.” 

“ Nor father ” 

“Well, yes, with father, if he has his 
great goose-gun with him.” 

Nochie drowned a sigh in a big spoon- 
ful of bread and milk and cheese. 


IV. 



wo weeks after this, and while the 


good Nederlanders were still talk- 
ing of the routing they had given the 
English transport, Jacob Van Tassel did 
not come home, neither did his great 
goose-gun. Affairs had gone on very 
smoothly till to-day, and not a piece of 
foreign craft of any description had been 
seen upon the waters of their beloved 
Tappan Sea. Now, after a long day of 
wondering where the father was, Vrouw 
Van Tassel, Widow Van Wurmer, and 
Nochie sat down to the supper-table 
without him. 

Vrouw Van Tassel had adopted a 
frugal table custom which greatly en- 
tertained Nochie. Suspended from the 


Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 35 

rafters above the table was a large lump 
of sugar, which was swung from mouth 
to mouth as it was needed to sweeten 
the very good tea served from a digni- 
fied Delft teapot by Vrouw Van Tassel. 

Nochie had just set the sugar lump 
to swinging in a line with her aunts 
chin, when Oloffe Kieft opened the 
back door with no preliminary knock, 
and walked in, his pipe between his 
lips as usual, though no smoke came 
from it, and a deep scowl was caught 
between his bushy eyebrows. At a 
respectful distance followed Yan. 

“ Be Jacob here, Vrouw Van Tassel } 
Oloffe asked. 

Vrouw Van Tassel looked up from 
her pewter plate more surprised at the 
sudden presence of the questioner 
than at his question. Never before 
had she known Oloffe Kieft to go so 
far from his tavern bench. 


2,6 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

“Jacob here? No, good neighbor,” 
she said, “ but we look for him every 
moment.” 

“ Did he take the great goose-gun ? ” 
he asked, the scowl becoming an anxious 
frown. 

“ That he did,” answered Widow Van 
Wurmer ; “ he always does if he be going 
any distance into the wood.” 

“Saint Nicholas pity us, then,” Oloffe 
said slowly. “ Pompey has gone too ; 
it be a bad look-out for us.” 

Vrouw Van Tassel dropped her knife 
and fork with a clatter. “ Oloffe Kieft,” 
she cried, “ you don’t mean anything has 
happened Jacob Van Tassel? ” 

“ No, no, not for sure,” he said, while 
Nochie, with a pale, scared face, left 
the table and went nearer Yan;“but 
I thought it neighborly to tell you, 
in case he does not come back, to 
keep well locked up. There are some 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 37 

whipper-snapper Tories hanging about 
the bush, and making free with such 
beef and bacon as they can find on 
four legs. There be something said, 
too, about a big Tory craft being seen 
on the Tappan Sea that be headed 
this way. It be well to look out. 
Send over to us if you need any- 
thing ; ” and with a long draw upon his 
pipe, — which now began to smoke as 
usual, its owner having accomplished 
his errand, — he turned about and 
stalked slowly out. 

Nochie began to cry. 

“ Never mind, Nochie,” said Yan, step- 
ping nearer her ; “ I ’ll stay, and if you ’ll 
lend me a gun, I ’ll fight, and fight for 
you, till your father comes.” 

“ I know you will, Yan,” she answered, 
wiping her eyes; “but it be because 
father does n’t come that I be so 


38 Christmas at T appall Sea. 

worried.. What if he should never 
come i 

Yan looked very grave. 

“ I wish we had had nothing to do 
with that old Pompey,” he said; “it 
makes me feel as if I had helped your 
father to be kidnapped away.” 

“ Oh, Yan,” said Nochie, with a chok- 
ing sound in her voice, “ he be n’t kid- 
napped, a big man like him with the 
great goose-gun ! Don’t say that.” 

“ I won’t, Nochie,” replied Yan, man- 
fully; “but if anything like that has 
happened to him, Nochie, I ’ll try my 
best to find him ; I ought to.” 

“So ought I,” said Nochie, grievingly, 
“’cause it was both of us, Yan.” 

Dinah stood near, wringing her hands ; 
while Widow Van Wurmer and Vrouw 
Van Tassel, withdrawn to the big chim« 
ney-corner, held a council of war. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 39 

“ I know what we can do,” said 
Nochie, her eyes brightening ; “ we ’ll 
go and ask the good Saint Nicholas to 
keep father from harm. Every Christ- 
mas when I ask him for things, he 
brings them, — a great big doll, some 
tulip bulbs, a little spinning-wheel 
just like mother’s, and a ring. Come, 
Yan.” 

Yan shook his head. “ I tell you, 
Nochie,” he said, “ you go, while I run 
home cross-cuts, and get my own gun ; 
then I ’ll come back as soon as ever I 
can, and bring you the last news. 
Good-by;” and he sped out of the door 
like a streak. 

In the parlor — that room of state, 
opened only for funerals, marriages, 
the Festival of Saint Nicholas, and a 
weekly resanding and dusting — was 
kept the Saint Nicholas which Nochie 


40 Christmas at Tappaji Sea. 

had referred to. He stood upon the 
mantel a bright metal image not more 
than a foot high, and burnished till he 
outshone the weathercocks. On either 
side of him was a plaster cat ; its back, 
face, and tail spotted with red and green 
paint. 

With Vans disappearance, Nochie 
turned toward the parlor. Almost 
from force of habit, she took off her 
shoes and entered the room in her 
stocking feet, using the utmost pre- 
caution not to disturb the complicated 
curves and angles laid out in the sand 
upon the floor. 

Not stopping now to admire the 
beautiful cats as she had always done 
before, she reached up on tiptoe to 
Saint Nicholas, and whispered in deepest 
confidence: “Dear Saint Nicholas, you 
be always so good to me ; don’t let 



‘‘Dear Salnt Nicholas, you be always so good 
TO me!” 






Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 41 

anything happen to my father, but 
bring him home all safe, please, please 
do, and I will knit twice as many 
rows every day, and help mother to 
spin, and not get saucy to Aunt 
Nochie, but be very good all day 
long.” 

A few tears dripped on Saint Nicho- 
las’s feet, and ran over the knuckles 
of the plump soft fingers with which 
Nochie held to the mantel. 

“ Mercy sakes ! where be that child 
now?” she heard some one say. It 
was the Widow Van Wurmer’s voice. 

Nochie started, and hastened from 
the mantel and the room, closing the 
door without a jar. 

“ Nochie, Nochie,” called her mother, 
anxiously, “come to me.’’ Then, as 
Nochie appeared, she cried, “ Why be 
your shoes off?” 


42 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

Nochie’s eyes drooped. “I will put 
them right on,” she said. 

In the mean time the energetic 
Widow Van Wurmer bustled about, 
putting the whole available household 
into a state of defence, which was the 
result of the council of war. The 
piece of “ ordnance ” they had most 
depended upon in case of attack was 
the great goose-gun. This being gone 
with its owner, .she fitted out Dinah, 
a couple of stable boys, Vrouw Van 
Tassel, and herself with kettles, sauce- 
pans, tongs, brooms, and staves, and 
sent them so armed, one by one, to 
the upper story of the mansion, where 
Jacob Van Tassel had opened loop- 
holes for just such an emergency. 

And the emergency grew more press- 
ing, for through the upper windows they 
could descry in the evening dusk that 


Christmas at Tappa^i Sea. 43 

the Tory craft was riding at anchor on 
the shore of the Tappan Sea, while its 
crew, with shout and laughter, were 
making their way up the land-rise 
toward the Van Tassel Homestead, or 
“ Roost,” as the mansion was called. 


V. 



T this moment the back door 


rattled, and to the call, “ Let 
me in,” Widow Van Wurmer opened 
it to admit Yan, panting for breath, 
his little gun on his shoulder. 

The Widow Van Wurmer was clearly 
surprised to see Yan again. 

“ Are they willing you should come ? ” 
she asked ; “ it be dangerous here.” 

“ That be why I told Nochie I would 
come,” he said with bright eyes ; “ where 
be she ? ” 

“ You had better see for yourself, 
then scamper home to your father as 
fast as you can.” Yan’s mother was 
dead. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 45 

“ Will you all come with me ? 
he said. “ Father said you should all 
come.” 

“ Yan Onderdonck Kieft ! ” exclaimed 
the Widow Van Wurmer, “ there be not 
a Van Tassel that will leave this roof 
till it be burned over them ; ” and she 
began piling chairs and pushing tables 
against the door he had just entered. 

In spite of the seriousness of the 
occasion, Yan giggled at her prepara- 
tions for barring out the enemy. 

“ Be you going?” she cried, drawing 
back a chair to make room for his 
exit, and stamping her foot. 

“Not I,” he answered. 

“ Very well, stay then,” she said ; then 
added in a softer tone, as Yan helped 
her push the last table against the 
door, “ Nochie be in the garret; take 
your gun and go to her.” 


46 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

Already there was a thumping and 
pounding against the doors and win- 
dows and walls of the house, with a 
few wild whoops and a shot or two. 

“ It be time for you to come too,” 
Yan said to Widow Van Wurmer; but 
she waved him ahead. Looking back, 
he saw that she followed him with a 
martial step and no show of fear. 

In the garret Yan set himself to 
guard one loop-hole, while the stable- 
boys took three others, and Vrouw 
Van Tassel, Dinah, and Nochie tried 
to do justice to the others, subject 
to the strict orders of Widow Van 
Wurmer. 

“ It be no wonder Jacob said she was 
equal to the stoutest-hearted man in the 
country,” Vrouw Van Tassel thought, as 
she watched the valiant widow; “this 
seems to be her forter 


Christmas at Tappa^i Sea. 47 

The pounding below grew more vigo- 
rous and persistent. Something gave 
way with a crash. The widow peeped 
through her loop-hole, and flung a flat- 
iron upon the heads of the front-door 
assailants. 

“Yan, fire your gun,” she cried; 
“ Katrina, the best pot and kettle ; you 
boys there, the bricks, the brooms, the 
everything you can lay your hands on ; 
Dinah, the kettle of tar, — turn it slowly, 
aim it well.” 

At the same time she flung shovel, 
tongs, and an open bag of saltpetre 
from her loop-hole, so that the enemy, 
who had now completely surrounded 
the house, were assaulted from above 
with a “ rain ” of terror. 

There was a moment’s silence; then 
the hooting, mingled with a groan or 
two, was renewed, with the smashing in 


48 Christmas at Tappa 7 i Sea. 

of doors and windows, and a cry of 
fire. 

Yan peered out. 

“ Yes, we must go, Nochie, right 
away,” he said ; “ they have set fire to 
us.” 

“ To be sure ! ” cried Widow Van 
Wunner, “ the varlets could think of 
nothing braver to do. Come, Katrina, 
Nochie, Yan, everybody, — come before 
we are smoked out like wasps.” 

In an instant the}^ were all below 
stairs, groping their way toward escape, 
amid blinding smoke and roaring flame. 

“ S-hush, s-hush !” said the Widow Van 
Wurmer; “we will go out the little side 
door, hidden by the grape-trellis. Ah ! 
there is a shout ; some one is coming to 
help us. Now wait here a moment ; ” and 
she marshalled her retreating forces to 
the dense grape-grown trellis, while the 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 49 

crackling and banging and shouting 
went on about them. 

Nochie caught Van’s hand. “ Oh, 
Van, there be the good Saint Nicholas ; 
we must not leave him to burn, or he 
will not help us to find father ! ” and she 
darted into the house, along the hallway, 
to the parlor door, which the assailants 
had left wide open, after ransacking 
every corner of the room. Without 
stopping to take off shoes this time, she 
rushed in and picked up the metal Saint 
Nicholas from the floor, where he had 
evidently been dropped, in the pillager’s 
hot haste. 

“ Poor, poor Saint Nicholas ! ” she 
cried, rushing out again, to meet Van 
in the hallway, trying to follow her. 

“ I have it. Van, the good Saint Nicho- 
las ! Here, you take it, — it will be 
safer ; ” and she put it in his hands just 


4 


50 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

as there was a falling in of timber and 
a cloud of plaster-dust all about them. 

The next thing that Nochie realized 
was that with her mother, Aunt Nochie, 
and Dinah, she was watching the flames 
eat the last fragment of her home, while 
in the beautiful red glow it cast upon 
the Tappan Sea the freebooters were 
seen already putting off from shore, as 
if satisfied that their dreadful work was 
well done. Their parting hoots and 
hurrahs rang hard against the hills. 

And Yan, — Yan had as totally dis- 
appeared as either Jacob Van Tassel or 
Pompey. 


VI. 


QIBBET ISLAND, as all New Ned- 
erlanders know, is within easy 
reach of the inirror-like Tappan Sea. 
Its coast abounds in high rocks, that 
threaten dangerous landing to any 
but the initiated, who at this time 
were freebooters, water-pirates, and that 
rough, roistering set of men whom the 
settlers much more willingly classed as 
Tories than as Whigs. 

Yan, suddenly gathered up in the 
arms of a stranger, wriggled like a 
flounder ; called for help, though un- 
heard in the crashing timber and crush- 
ing plaster ; then resigned himself to a 
fate which pushed his hat farther over 
his eyes, scrambled with him down the 


52 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

cow-path to the edge of the Tappan 
Sea, and stowed him away in the hold 
of a bulky transport that made toward 
Gibbet Island with him, just as a 
farmer who had twice shot his gun in 
the Van Tassel defence stole up to 
Nochie’s mother, as she turned again 
and again, loath to leave. 

“Be anything wanted, Vrouw.^’^ he 
asked kindly. 

“ Be anything wanted ? ” she repeated, 
like one adream ; “ everything be wanted, 
— a husband, a home, and Yan — where 
be Yan ? 

“ Yan be most like on the cross cut 
home, to tell Oloffe you are coming,” 
answered the man, unsuspiciously. 

“ It would be all a piece with the rest 
if we never see him again,” said the 
Widow Van Wurmer, who now that 
the life and death emergency was over. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 53 

descended from her heroic plain of 
family defender, and seemed as de- 
pressed and saddened as the rest. 

“ Who wants a little lad like him ? ” 
said the farmer; while Nochie cried: 
“ Of course he has gone straight home. 
He was here when I went to get the 
Saint Nicholas; and of course he has 
gone right home with it, so it will be 
safe.” 

“ Blessed be it ! ” cried Dinah. “ Dat 
de chile has gone done sabed de good 
ole Saint Nicholas ; dat mean some good, 
anyhows ! ” 

The farmer went with them until the 
tavern came in sight, very dark and 
not a little afraid of freebooters on its 
own behalf. No one there could tell a 
word of Yan. 

In the mean time Yan, well enough 
versed in local geography to suspect 


54 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

where he was going, was already hatch- 
ing a plan for his escape from the lonely 
island. “ I will dive and swim from the 
island to the other shore,’' he said to 
himself ; “ in the dark it will be easy.” 

At this instant the craft came to port 
with a tremendous thud ; and with boxes, 
bales, and bundles of cargo, Yan was 
left upon the island, in charge of a bluff 
sailor, who pretended to speak neither 
English nor Hollandish, and in perfect 
silence kept so shrewd a watch upon 
Yan that there was no chance of his 
getting away. 

How glad, then, was he, about sunrise 
and after the weary sleepless night, to 
see a boat, quite large and pretentious, 
coming toward them. 

Soon it ran alongside the island ; and 
the glum sailor, helping to load it with 
the captured cargo, neglected his guard 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 55 

of Yan, and gave him the opportunity 
to dive and try to swim to safety. 

Standing near a crate of cackling 
chickens, Yan buttoned his jacket over 
the metal Saint Nicholas, preparatory to 
the run and plunge, when this little act 
brought a new idea to him. What bet- 
ter chance could he have for finding 
Nochie’s father than to go peacefully 
with his captors } He would not try to 
escape. 

This resolution taken, he helped to 
lift a box or two aboat, and, leaning 
against the taffrail as they sailed rapidly 
away, he observed everything around 
him with increasing interest. 

“ Well, my lad,” said an officer in full 
English uniform, coming up to him, and 
taking a seat, “ for a son of Oloffe 
Kieft, and friend to the Van Tassels, 
you seem wonderfully willing to go 


56 Christmas at T appall Sea, 

along with a Tory turn-out; or perhaps 
you feared Gibbet Island ? 

Yan scanned the officer’s face, and 
saw a twinkle in his eye. 

“ P’raps I was feared of it,” said Yan 
dryly, — 

“ ‘ For three merry lads be we, 

And three merry lads be we 
J on the land, and thou on the sand. 

And Jack on the gallows-tree.’” 

“ Ah, yes ! ” said the officer, stroking 
his mustache, for he knew that Yan 
was quoting the song of the three Tory 
freebooters hung on Gibbet Island, “ and 
what about witches ” 

“We don’t have them much here- 
abouts, not as they tell of having them 
over at Salem,” Yan answered honestly; 
“ there be charms and good Saint 
Nicholas to keep them off.” 

“ Oh, to be sure,” laughed the officer, 


Christmas at Tappa 7 i Sea. 57 

“ Saint Nicholas is worth a great deal. 
In my country we have Saint George.” 

“ That be England ? ” questioned Yan, 
who had been studying out the ofificer s 
uniform. 

“ Yes,” said the officer. 

“ Is that where we be going ? ” 

“ No,” was the answer ; “ we ’re headed 
for New Amsterdam, as you Neder- 
landers like to say, — to New York 
we call it.” 

Yan’s eyes brightened in spite of his 
circumstances. For a moment he for- 
got he was a prisoner, with this hand- 
some officer talking so freely to him, 
and he remembered only how much he 
had always wanted to see the wonder- 
ful city he had heard so much of. 

Suddenly his eyes clouded. 

“ What will you do with me there?” 
he asked soberly. 


58 Christmas at Tappafi Sea, 


“ Make you useful,” the officer re- 
sponded. Can you run errands ? ” 

“ Try me,” answered Yan. 

“ Without running away, I mean,” said 
the officer. 

‘‘ I never ran away in my life,” an^ 
swered Yan, sturdily. 

“ Not from the enemy .? ” the officer 
asked. 

Again Yan looked up into the officer’s 
face, this time to see he was quizzing 
him. He flushed, and changed the 
subject. 

“ Be there many negro people in 
New York?” 

“ Yes, plenty,” answered the officer. 

“ Be any of them named Pompey ? ” 

The officer looked at Yan keenly, 
and read his thought. 

“You had better let well enough 
alone, my lad,” he said ; “ it will take 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 59 

more than you or your friends, young 
galligaskins, to find Pompey or rescue 
Jacob Van Tassel;” and he rose from 
his seat and walked away. 

“ Will it.^ ” thought Yan. 


VIL 


TF Yan could have communicated in 
some way with his friends, and 
thus let them know of his safety, he 
would at first have been quite happy in 
New York, so alert and bustling was 
it with the coming and going of jolly 
soldiery, and so astir with colonial life 
and spirit. 

As it was, he filled the position of 
page to the handsome officer who had 
talked with him upon the boat, and was 
comfortably housed and fed. 

Once or twice there had been a strong 
temptation to escape ; but he lingered 
on, hoping to hear something that would 
guide him in his watch for Jacob Van 
Tassel and Pompey. But the situation 


Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 6i 

became wearing and irksome; he grew 
weary of feeling that he was under a 
system of espionage, however unobtru- 
sive it seemed to be ; and when he over- 
heard a talk of sending him out of the 
country, he lay awake at night with 
visions of his Dutch home and Nochie 
in his mind. He had, too, a new feel- 
ing of sympathy for Jacob Van Tassel, 
whose circumstances were like, yet might 
be very much worse than, his own ; and 
he nodded across in the dark to Saint 
Nicholas, who stood unharmed on a 
little shelf in his room, as if he were 
saying, “ You and L good Saint Nicholas, 
mmst look out more sharply for our- 
selves, and not forget we be sworn to 
find Jacob Van Tassel if we can.’’ 

The next morning, as it happened, the 
officer called Yan to him with a serious 
expression upon his face. 


62 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

“ Yan,” he said, “how long have you 
been with me ? ” 

“ Sixteen months,” Yan promptly 
answered ; for he had carefully counted 
it over in the night. 

“ Ahem ! ” said the officer, clearing 
his throat. “ You are sure of it.f^ ” 

“ Yes, sir, I be,” responded Yan. “ I 
was taken July twenty-seventh, seventeen 
hundred and seventy-five ; from that to 
last July would be a twelvemonth, and 
from the twelvemonth till now, Novem- 
ber twenty-eight, seventeen hundred and 
seventy-six, makes it sixteen m.onths as 
I count. I was fourteen then, now I be 
fifteen ; ” and his face sobered. 

“ Well,” continued the officer, “ when 
one has found a boy trusty and honor- 
able for sixteen consecutive months, one 
can go a little farther with him, don’t 
you think so 'I ” 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 63 

“ Yes, sir,” answered Yan, a little 
dubious as to what all this was leading 
to. 

“ Then right about face, my lad ; here 
is a note that must be taken to Captain 
Pointer, frigate ‘ Vulcan,’ at the docks. 
I give you one hour to go in, two to 
get back in ; it is now nine o’clock, 
at twelve report with the answer.” 

“ Yes, sir,” replied Yan, delighted with 
a commission that was to take him 
beyond his usual limit; “be Sam or 
Willets to go along } ” 

“ Neither,” said the officer ; “ I shall 
trust you alone. Be sure and remem- 
ber Captain Pointer’s exact reply. It 
will be in words, and not written. 
And, Yan,” he continued, a peculiar 
expression settling on his face. 

“ Yes, sir,” said Yan. 

“ In case you are captured and 


64 Christmas at Tappaii Sea. 

searched, you know what to do with the 
note, don’t you ? ” 

Yan looked at the officer with a 
twinkle in his eyes, and made his full 
set of perfect teeth move up and down. 

The officer nodded, while Van’s face 
suddenly became extremely grave. 

“ I be a Whig, be n’t I ? ” he asked. 

The officer nodded again. 

“ What kind of a Whig would I be 
to eat a Tory note that might help the 
Whigs if they were to get it from me ? ” 

“ A poor one,” answered the officer. 
“ I see what you are after, Yan ; ” and 
going to a desk, he rewrote his note 
in such obscure language that it was 
worthless to any one but he to whom 
it was sent. 

“Now we’re all right; be off with 
you, Yan, and back by twelve, — do you 
mind, my lad ? ” 


Christmas at Tap pan Sea. 65 

“ If I be alive, sir ; ” and Yan, guard- 
less for once, and light-hearted, was 
already on his way. 

Had even Van’s father met him on 
the street that morning, he would 
scarcely have known him ; for instead 
of a short plump boy in full knicker- 
bockers, and a jacket trimmed with 
bright metal buttons exactly like 
Oloffe’s own, he wore a trim, close-fit- 
ting suit of Continental blue, gilt knee- 
buckles which showed just a trifle above 
his top-boots, and a cocked hat that was 
set quite jauntily above his queue, instead 
of the broad-brimmed head-cover of a 
year ago, while in figure he had become 
tall and slight. 

Getting nearer the water, he took in 
long breaths of the salt air, swung his 
arms to and fro in a sort of abandon 
to this comparative freedom, then 

5 


66 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

hastened on, — for there was no time 
to lose, — while many turned to see 
where this fine-looking lad was going 
at such a rapid rate. 

He had reached the region now where 
buildings were very scattered, and 
indeed had simmered down to a few 
lonely cabins along the edge of the salt 
marsh, when the door of the most 
wretched of these cabins opened, and 
in the doorway stood tall, lank, stoop- 
shouldered Pompey. There was no 
mistaking him. 

He held his hand above his eyes as 
if looking for some one, and for an 
instant fixed his glance upon Yan ; 
then, dropping his hand like one dis- 
appointed, went in and slammed the 
door. 

For a moment Van’s heart beat so 
fast he could not move. Recovering 


CJiristnias at Tappan Sea. 67 

from this, his next impulse was to rush 
to the cabin and demand of Pompey 
where Jacob Van Tassel was hidden. 
Then he stopped to consider. He was 
a captive held by his word to do a com- 
mission by a certain time. Evidently 
Pompey had not recognized him. He 
would probably be there, if he were to 
come back that afternoon or the next- 
day. 

“ To-morrow morning I shall come,” 
said Yan, conclusively, and with a 
jump that took him six feet nearer his 
destination ; “ for I will be free, I must 
be free, or my name is not Yan Onder- 
donck Kieft ! ” 

The whiffs of sea-air, sharpened to 
needle-points by keen November, were 
bracing his spirits like wine ; he ran, 
he galloped, he sprang, he could not 
seem to contrive a motion that would 


68 Christmas at T appall Sea. 

take him to his destination fast 
enough. 

While it yet wanted a quarter of ten, 
hat in hand, he put the note into Captain 
Pointer s fingers. 

“You are warm, my lad; and no 
wonder, for you have made good time. 
Can you do as well in taking the 
answer.? ” 

Van’s face fell, for he had planned a 
little detour on his way back, which 
would allow him a more critical inspec- 
tion of Pompey’s cabin, and yet let him 
reach “ home ” by twelve. 

He threw back his shoulders, and 
looked Captain Pointer squarely in the 
face. “ I ’ll try to, sir,” was his an- 
swer. 

“ That ’s right,” said the captain ; and 
taking Yan one side, he repeated to him 
a formula of words on which the fate 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 69 

of a nation might (or might not) depend, 
yet to the messenger was as meaning- 
less as Egyptian hieroglyphics. 

“ I don’t like this, I don’t like this,” 
said Yan, turning about; “it be poor 
business for a Whig. What did I give 
my word for? Well, here I go for the 
last time ; ” and breaking into a dog trot, 
with his arms set akimbo, he ran with 
unbroken speed till he reached his 
officer’s headquarters, not even slacking 
his gait when he passed near Pompey’s 
cabin. 

“ Here, my young Whigster,” said the 
officer, who had been restlessly pacing 
up and down the room, and not now 
looking overjoyed to see Yan . so soon 
back. “ You shall have that for your 
promptness ; ” and he flung Yan a coin. 
“ What is your message ? ” 

Yan was puzzled. The officer’s looks 


70 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

belied his words. The boy made no 
offer to pick up the money. 

“I have it,” said Yan ; “but what’ll 
be the cost if I keep it?'' 

“ The cost ? ” repeated the officer. 

“ Yes ; that be — I mean,” explained 
Yan, fingering his hat nervously, “ that 
if it be anything to bring harm to the — 
our Whigs, sir, I will keep it. I did n’t 
think so much about this at first, sir.” 

“You may be shot, put to death, if 
you don’t tell me,” said the officer. 

Yan’s face, red and flushed from' his 
rapid run, turned white, but he said 
nothing. 

“Yan,” said the officer, veering about 
suddenly in his walk up and down the 
room, which he had resumed, “ take my 
word for it, there’s not a syllable in the 
message that can harm a colonist now 


or ever. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 7 1 

The color came back to Van’s face. 
‘‘ Thank you, sir,” he said ; and he re- 
peated to him the formula of words, 
which the officer listened to indifferently. 

Van stooped and picked up the coin, 
then took the officer’s extended right 
hand. 

“ You are glad of the coin, Van } ” he 
asked. 

‘T have not seen so much money 
since — ” and a mist came over the 
boy’s eyes. 

“ Since when ? ” asked the officer. 

“Since I was home,” finished Van, 
with an effort. 

“ Ah ! ” was the officer’s only obser- 
vation, as he with seeming abstraction 
opened a book. 

In the morning when Van was called, 
he was not there. The officer was told. 
His start denoted surprise. Yesterday 


72 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

was the day he had thought of Van’s 
escaping. 

“ So he has taken his chance at last,” 
he said to himself ; my lads would have 
tried it long before ; ” and he fell to think- 
ing of his sturdy boys in England. To 
do him justice, it may be said that he 
had no idea of Pompey’s whereabouts 
at this time ; but he foresaw a “ Tory” 
retreat in which Van were far better at 
home. 


VIII. 


"Y'AN, free, was a night- wanderer. 

The streets were dark, and lav- 
ishly glazed with a sleet that came 
down like glass beads, and like glass 
beads glimmered and glittered wher- 
ever pale strips of candle or whale-oil 
light reached out into the night from 
the little windows of some late-hour 
resort. 

Yan buttoned the metal Saint Nicho- 
las snugly under his jacket, and slipped 
and slid on his way, sometimes feeling 
as if he were treading a maze, so per- 
versely did the streets, “ evoluted ” from 
cow-paths, seem to twist and turn in the 
deep darkness. 


74 Christmas at Tappaii Sea. 

“ If Nochie were here, she would say, 
‘ Good Saint Nicholas, give me night 
eyes, that I may see where I be going ; ’ 
now haste be waste ; ” and he took shel- 
ter under a buttonwood-tree till at four 
o’clock a little light would be thrown 
on his search for the most retired way 
of reaching Pompey’s cabin. 

He gave no thought of how to 
approach the old vagrant, nor of 
danger to himself when by six o’clock 
he rattled the door-latch, pushed against 
the door, and called, “ Let me in.” 

There was a shuffling inside, and a 
call of, “ What be wanted t ” 

“ Open the door and s^e,” was Van’s 
response. 

“ Friend or foe } ” called the old 
man. 

Van considered his reply. Something 
in the old man’s tremulous tones, as well 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 75 

as his wretched cabin and surroundings, 
told Yan he had a poverty-stricken cus- 
tomer to deal with. His fingers twirled 
the officer’s coin in his pocket. 

“ Some one with money for you,” 
answered Yan. 

“ Heben be tanked ! ” cried the old 
man, “ for I be near starbed waiting. 
I taut you ’d neber come ; ” and he 
fumbled at the bolt with hands that 
shook as he drew it with a rusty 
creak. 

Yan stepped in, and Pompey stepped 
back. 

“ Lordy Massy ! ” he cried, “ you be n’t 
de one I taut you was. Who be 
you } ” 

“ I be Yan Kieft, and I want you 
to tell me where Jacob Van Tassel 
be.?” 

The old darkey sat down on his bed. 


76 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 


shaking his head disconsolately. “ Done 
forget all ’bout it,” he said. 

“ No, you have n’t,” said Yan. “ Think 
hard and talk fast; time be precious.” 

“ No, no, no,” mumbled the old man. 

“ Then I ’ll call the Continental Con- 
gress and have you arrested,” persisted 
Yan. 

“ Dat ’ll be no harm,” said the old 
man, captiously. “ One feels most like 
turning Whig, anyways, when de Tories 
treats you like a ole wore-out pair ob 
shoes.” 

“ They kicked you off ” asked Yan. 

“ Ay, an’ worser, jdey hab lef me wid- 
out eben a pipe or a timble of ’baccy 
to put in it. Yore fader was kinder 
dan dat; he alius ’lowed ole Pompey 
a good smoke ebry day.” 

“I’ll do better than that.” said Yan. 
“ Tell me where to find Jacob Van 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 77 

Tassel, and I ’ll give you a gold piece 
that ’ll buy you ’baccy for a year’s 
smoking, twice a day ; ” and he held up 
the coin between his thumb and finger. 

Pompey’s dull eyes shone like the 
gleam of the gold. 

“ I don’t know, young Massa, ’bout 
him now,” he said ; “ but as true as 
libing and breving, de night I ’scorted 
him to dis ’ere city, he war put aboard 
a ship for Boston, where de Tories was 
pooty strong.” 

“Do you think he be there now?” 
Yan asked eagerly. 

“ Don’t know nuffun more ’bout it, 
sail ; but de English dey hab n’t had so 
much to do wiv Boston sence last March.” 

“ That be so,” said Yan, knitting his 
brows ; “ do you think he be here in 
New York ? ” 

“ No, sah ! no, sah,” said Pompey, so 


78 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 


precipitately that Yan, rising, looked at 
him sharply. 

“ Where ’s de money ” asked Pompey. 

“ You have n’t earned it,” Yan an- 
swered, dropping it into his pocket as 
he moved toward the door. 

Pompey raised his eyes to the bare 
loft, rolling them piously from corner 
to corner. 

“ What a pusson don’t know, dat he 
can’t tell ; but dare be good fishing in 
Canady.” 

“Which place ” asked Yan, quickly. 
“ Montreal ? 

Pompey made no sign. 

“ Quebec ? ” 

Pompey ’s eyes closed and opened; 
and he put out his hand, which opened 
and closed as Yan dropped the coin 
into it and, hastening away, disappeared 
in the direction of the wharf. 


Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 79 

“ Yan be bright,” said the old man, 
“ but he ’ll hab to be as bright as de 
sun an’ moon an’ stars tugeder, to 
find Jacob Van Tassel in Canady;” 
and he laughed as he pocketed the 


com 


IX. 

‘\/"AN knew it would not do for him 
to hang about the wharf. A 
vessel flying an English pennant 
looked just ready for sea. He ran 
aboard, and asked the captain where 
she was going. 

“ Canada,” said the captain, shortly, 
“if we can get there; and I never have 
known her to miss a trip yet.” 

Van’s heart leaped. 

“ I ’ll go along,” he said. 

“We don’t take passengers,” said the 
captain, “not without special permits.” 

“ I ’ll work my way,” said Van. 

“You look like it,” said the captain. 
“ I ’ve tried your kind before ; they put 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 8i 

on gloves, so to speak, when they went 
to handle the ropes ; ” and he shrugged 
his shoulders. 

“ That be n’t my kind,” responded 
Yan, coloring. 

“ Then what kind be you } ” asked 
the captain, turning one side to give 
an order about lifting a heavy box. 

“ I be this kind,” answered Yan; and 
springing forward, he helped the sailor 
to lift the box to its place. 

“ All right, then,” said the captain ; 
“ if that be your stamp, we ’ll let you 
earn your passage, but there be not a 
cent to boot.” 

“ I don’t mind, if you ’ll throw in a 
little food.” 

The captain raised his eyebrows. 

“You be hungry he asked; “coil 
that rope, and there ’ll be a call to mess 
soon.” 


6 


82 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

Under full sail, and a good breakfast 
eaten, Yan had a few moments to him- 
self, in which he more carefully weighed 
Pompey’s information that he recalled 
with slight mistrust. 

“ Boys be blunderers, as father says,” 
he reflected. “Now I be pulling off from 
shore at this rate I can see I had better 
have tried to reach home, and got help 
for Jacob Van Tassel there; but then 
there is Nochie with her faith in Saint 
Nicholases ; ” and a little comforted, he 
answered the captain’s call to him. 

Two hours out, and their vessel 
ran alongside a prison ship riding at 
anchor. 

Yan noticed it closely. It was the 
first time he had seen a jail afloat. 

“ Any one new on board 1 ” called the 
captain of the vessel to the prison ship. 

“ No, no,” replied the prison-ship war- 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 83 

den ; “ no one newer than our old stand- 
by, Van Tassel.” 

“ How be he ” the captain of the 
vessel asked, while Yan listened in 
keen-eared interest, his heart in his 
throat. 

“ Quiet,” was the answer ; “ but as 
good for fighting as his great goose- 
gun, if he has a chance. Who is that 
boy you have aboard in all that fine 
toggery ? ” 

“ A lad working his way to Canada t ” 
was the response. 

“ Canada, I vow,'’ cried the warden ; 
“ what ’s his name } ” 

The captain turned toward Yan, who 
had drawn back. 

“ What be your name, lad } ” he 
questioned. 

“ Yan Onderdonck Kieft,” he replied, 
beginning to see his way clearer. 


84 Christmas at Tappafi Sea. 

“ You have been with General Clifton, 
and be getting away from him ? ” the 
prison warden demanded. 

“ Yes, sir,” Yan said. 

“ Out of the frying-pan into the fire, 
then, you young freebooter ! Tie him 
and send him to us, Captain Atcomb; 
he belongs here.” 

“ To be sure,” said Captain Atcomb ; 
and Yan, offering no resistance, was 
quickly transferred to the deck of the 
prison ship, and led below deck to a 
little cell scarcely large enough for 


one. 


X. 

JgECAUSE Yan showed no disposi- 
tion to be unruly, but passively 
accepted his fate, he was soon released 
from rigid imprisonment, and set to 
making himself useful about the ship. 

One day, after being two weeks aboard, 
he was sent to serve food to the other 
prisoners. This was what he of all 
things wished, as it would give him his 
first chance, and the best chance, to see 
Jacob Van Tassel. 

Nochie’s father sat by himself in a 
dark corner of the hold, more strongly 
manacled than the others, and he did 
not even glance up as Yan came to him 
with a plate of stale food in his hand. 


86 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

Yan dropped a crust of bread, and 
stooped to pick it up. Still Jacob did 
not look up. In an instant Yan had 
drawn Saint Nicholas from under his 
jacket, and set it boldly upon the table 
beside Jacob. 

This time raising his head, Jacob 
started, and put out his hand toward 
the well-known Saint Nicholas ; then 
quickly withdrew it, and scanned Yan 
closely. 

Yan saw that he was not yet com- 
pletely recognized. “ Nochie,” he said, 
in the lowest voice, not daring to use 
his own name. 

“ Yan } ” Jacob whispered, with a keen 
glance. 

“ What be that on the table ? ” one 
of the guard asked at this moment. 

“ Only Saint Nicholas,” answered 
Yan. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 87 

“That be like a boy,” laughed the 
guard ; “ no sooner does December fairly 
come in than his mind must be running 
on Saint Nicholas, — as if we hang up 
stockings on prison ships. Bring it 
here, lad ; where did you get it ? ” 

Yan put it in the guard’s hand, who 
examined it closely, without answering. 

“ Not a bad piece of work ; but what 
do you do with it ? ” 

“ I can make it tell stories,” said Yan ; 
and no one but himself knew how long 
he had thought upon the special story 
he wanted it to tell. 

“ Show us how,” said the guard, put- 
ting it back into Yan’s hand. 

“ This way,” answered Yan, not allow- 
ing himself to hesitate, and pushing the 
table nearer the centre of the hold, as if 
he wished that all might see. “ Here 
be two friends ; ” and he held a narrow 


88 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

bread-crust beside Saint Nicholas, to rep- 
resent the other friend. “ They wish 
to take a journey together,” and here 
Yan looked casually toward Jacob Van 
Tassel, “ when a dog comes in and al- 
most gobbles the crust-friend up ; then 
the Saint Nicolas friend says, ‘ He will 
not eat me, I be metal ; that be not the 
kind of stuff he likes to eat,’ and he 
whisks his crust-friend under his coat, 
so ; ” and Yan tucked the crust under the 
arm of the metal cloak which fell from 
Saint Nicholas’s shoulder, “ and jumps 
with him into the air ; ” and Yan walked 
Saint Nicholas across the table with 
awkward strides, and jumped him into 
space, with a gesture that suggested 
Saint Nicholas plunging with his crust- 
friend into water. 

The prisoners, disposed to be enter- 
tained by any slight diversion, laughed; 


Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 89 

while Yan, anxious, glanced toward 
Jacob Van Tassel’s corner. 

Jacob had understood ; he raised a 
manacled wrist, and let it fall. 

Ah, the manacle ! Here was another 
difficulty. Yan, pondering it, gathered 
up the prisoners’ plates, and went out, 
in his abstraction leaving Saint Nicholas 
forgotten on the table. 


XI. 


T T was a week after this that the 
prison ship which had been hug- 
ging the shore, for the last ten days, 
rode up to the wharf, and was secured 
there. 

Yan, always on the lookout, saw 
Pompey fishing on the docks below ; 
and though it was the twenty-second 
of December, snowy and cold, he had 
seemingly brought up two or three 
fishes of very creditable appearance. 
The captain had also seen the old 
colored man and his fish. Indeed, 
Pompey was waving them toward the 
prison ship, as if he particularly wished 
it, and no other craft, to see his catch. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 91 

“ Yan,” said the captain, “you see 
that old curmudgeon with his fish ; give 
him this for them,” he handed Yan a 
little piece of money, “ and bring them 
up to me.” 

“ Yes, sir,” said Yan, springing across 
the gang-plank, which had just been 
placed for some sailors to go ashore. 

“ Pompey, you are as much a villain 
as ever,” the boy gasped ; “ just wait till 
we get you in Sleepy Hollow! Even 
your fish are stale, and of a month’s 
ago freezing.” 

“ Nochie be here,” said Pompey, 
stoically. “ I sawed her at the Van 
Wurmers’.” 

“ Nochie ! ” exclaimed Yan ; “ but how 
can I believe that ? It be like your say- 
ing Jacob Van Tassel was in Canada 
when he be here.” 

“ I neber sayed so, — no, sah.” 


92 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

“ What did I give you that money 
for, then ? ” and Yan looked at Pompey’s 
well-filled pipe. 

“ For ’baccy, sah.” 

Yan raised his fist, then let it drop to 
his side. 

“ Sorry to be dispinting, sah ; shall I 
take a message to Nochie.f^” 

The captain whistled for Yan’s 
return. 

Yan, starting to go back to the ship, 
shook his head. 

“I be in earnest dis time,” Pompey 
said. 

“ Then get me a file, Pompey.” 

“ Pompey be pore, he hab no money 
to buy a file ; ” and he glanced pointedly 
at the coin in Yan’s hand. 

Yan again shook his head. “ That 
be the captain’s,” he said. 

“ Here, Yan,” called the captain. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 93 

“ Yes, sir,” answered Yan, turning. 

Pompey stepped nearer him. “ I tell 
Nochie ’bout de file ; ’morrow morning 
watch out.” 

Yan made no sign of hearing him, 
though his eye brightened for an instant. 
Not once, since his first visit to the 
prisoner’s “ hold,” had he been able to 
see Jacob Van Tassel, nor could he 
find a file, nor anything that could be 
used as a file, in any corner of the ship. 
One English craft after another, weighted 
with the feeling that their side of the 
cause was losing ground, was clearing 
the New York harbor for safer water. 
“ Then where shall Jacob Van Tassel 
and Yan be,” he had asked himself, more 
depressed than ever before, “when the 
prison ship is ordered to leave Now, 
if there were still a chance ! but he 
doubted it. 


94 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

“ Well, slow-coach, where are the 
fish ? ” asked the Captain. 

Yan laughed, in spite of his sombre 
mood. “ Those be only some thawed 
out fish he was going to take us in by, — 
caught last fall, I expect. I would n’t 
buy them,” he answered, as he put the 
coin into the captain’s hand. 

“ So that was what kept you so long ; 
all right, you and I can wait a little 
longer for our fried fish,” and he clapped 
Yan on his shoulder, “rather than be 
taken in.” 

The following morning, in spite of his 
want of faith in anything that Pompey 
might say, Yan leaned over the ship- 
railing observing closely the motley 
going and coming of people of all kinds 
and stations. Soldiers and sailors pre- 
dominated, with a few women, here and 
there, buying or selling fruit — oranges. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 95 

lemons, and apples — from the covered 
stalls along the dock. 

Among them Yan noticed a little 
Dutch girl purchasing oranges, and 
looking shyly toward the prison ship. 
She was attended by a colored woman. 
Eureka ! it was Dinah ; and the little 
Dutchess, Nochie ! Yan sprang back 
from the rail as if he had been shot, and, 
like a shot, was across the gang-plank 
and close to Nochie’s side. 

“ Nochie, oh, Nochie ! ” he whispered ; 
“ we be safe, your father and I, but pris- 
oners. Help us to escape.” 

Nochie, with more discretion than 
Yan, kept her e3^es now fixed on the 
fruit-woman ; at the same time she 
pressed into Yan’s hand a file. 

“ That be what I came for,” she said. 
“ Pompey told me about the file. Now 
go ; they are coming for you ; ” and she 


96 Christmas at Tappaji Sea. 

took the oranges and turned away, as 
two brawny sailors seized Yan by the 
shoulders, and walked him back to the 
prison ship in great haste. 

“ You be a greenhorn to think you 
can get away that easy,” said the cap- 
tain to Yan, with a half-laugh in his 
eye. 

“ I was n’t trying to get away,” said 
Yan. 

“ Likely not,” said the captain, sus- 
piciously; “but after this you may stay 
below deck with the other prisoners.” 

“ Yes, sir,” said Yan, meekly. He had 
nearly said, “Thank you, sir,” — so glad 
was he to receive this order. 


XII. 


J N the hold among the other prison- 
ers, Yan was allowed to move 
about, but not to exchange a word, nor 
go near any one of them. 

He walked directly to the table, and, 
picking up the Saint Nicholas still 
standing there, began playing with it 
restlessly, casting a furtive glance now 
and then at Jacob Van Tassel, who he 
saw was as furtively watching him. 

Yan was asking himself how he was 
to get the file to Nochie’s father, when, in 
turning the image, he discovered that it 
was hollow. 

With a quick glance toward Jacob 
Van Tassel, and a sign which fastened 
his attention upon the Saint Nicholas, 
7 


98 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

Yan slipped the file into its hollow in- 
terior, followed it with a quick wadding- 
in of his handkerchief, tamped it down 
with his finger, and carried the Saint 
Nicholas, so loaded, to one of the 
guard. 

I don’t want your Saint Nicholas,” 
the guard said ; “ why be you fetching 
it to me } ” 

“You see that big man in the corner, 
— Jacob Van Tassel they call him. 
Well, he be wanting to see Saint Nicholas 
closer; won’t you take him to him?” 
asked Yan. 

“ Oh, go ’long with your nonsense ! ” 
responded the man ; “ soon you ’ll have 
us all playing with dolls ; ” but notwith- 
standing his words, he took the little 
figure and carried it to Jacob, who put 
out his chained hands as if most anxious 
to get it. 


Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 99 

“ Perhaps it reminds him of home,” 
said Yan, naively. 

“ It does, lad,” spoke up Jacob Van 
Tassel, solemnly. “ Not since twetve 
o’clock the night before Christmas Eve, 
two year ago, have I as much as 
touched good Saint Nicholas ; ” and with 
a heavy sigh that seemed loaded with 
discouragement, even to Van’s ears, he 
warily slid the file from its hiding-place, 
and wearily handed back the Saint 
Nicholas to the guard. 

Yan quickly ran over in his mind 
Jacob’s words, caught at the “twelve 
o’clock the night before Christmas Eve,” 
and, comprehending Jacob’s ruse as 
quickly as Jacob had comprehended his, 
he looked at him with bright eyes. 

Jacob nodded. It was settled, then, 
that they should attempt their escape 
at twelve o’clock that very night. Yan 


lOO Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

put out his hands to receive the Saint 
Nicholas from the guard with a heart 
that beat as light as down. Yet the 
escape was by no means sure ; it was only 
possible. Every now and then he stole 
a side glance at Nochie’s father ; but he 
had relapsed into his usual silence, and 
gave no further evidence of even seeing 
Yan. 

By nine the prisoners were asleep, or 
at least quiet, and the guard was re- 
duced to one man, who sat and smoked 
and at length himself soundly slept. 

Yan, stowed away in a close corner 
of the hold, and listening sharply, heard 
a smothered bit of filing going on in 
Jacob Van Tassel’s corner; but it so 
blended with the gnawing of the wharf- 
rats which had taken possession of the 
ship, that only a keen ear like Yan’s 
detected the difference. 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. loi 

Jacob’s fingers worked evenly and 
fast in the dark. Not an instant was 
lost, and by ten o’clock the manacle 
partly severed was wrenched from his 
left wrist. Then began the slower and 
more awkward filing upon the right 
handcuff. As if made of more unyield- 
ing metal than the left, it gave way 
but slowly, atom by atom ; and scarcely 
that, as the file, smoothed by friction, 
did its work indifferently. 

An old timepiece somewhere on the 
prison ship struck twelve. Yan crept 
from his corner, past the sleeping guard, 
to Jacob’s side. Seizing the file, he 
ground upon the stubborn manacle with 
might and main. If any of the other 
prisoners heard him or suspected his 
work, they gave no sign. 

Now the cleft was widening. Jacob 
took the file again, and with a stern 


102 Christmas at Tappaji Sea. 

stroke of the grooved iron that cut to his 
wrist, he lifted his right arm free. 

Jacob Van Tassel with both arms at 
liberty and the chain about his ankle 
unfastened, what was there to fear? He 
seized Van’s sleeve, pushed open the 
door, snapped like a pipe-stem the bolt 
that held down the hatchway door, 
stepped out upon deck, and, with Van 
at his side, plunged overboard. 

The deck-watch started. The splash 
aroused him like a stroke on his cheek. 
He went to look overboard. Nothinof 
was to be seen, and nothing more to be 
heard. Perhaps a big fish had plashed 
into port and gone out again. This 
had often happened ; there was no cause 
to arouse any one. His conscience logi- 
cally quieted, he returned to his snooze 
in the bow. 


XIII. 


^^OMING to the surface, Jacob Van 
Tassel and Yan swam to an angle 
in the dock which hid them from notice, 
and, scrambling up its sides, were on 
dry land. 

As yet, Jacob and Yan had not ex- 
changed a word. Cold and dripping, 
only stopping to take fresh breath, they 
ran farther from the city and tov/ard the 
river. By sunrise they were several 
miles from the city, and on ground 
familiar to Nochie’s father. 

Yan began to lose breath and step ; 
it was evident that he must rest. Then, 
for the first time, Jacob broke the silence. 

“ Yan, my lad,” he said, “ don’t give out 
now ; we ’ll soon be where it be safer.” 


104 Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 

“ I know it, Mynheer,” said Yan, 
panting and stumbling; “1 be a poor 
one to break this way.” 

“ Say nothing about it,” replied Jacob, 
huskily; and reaching down he caught 
the boy in his arms, and, striding over 
the crusty snow and through icy mud 
and mire, he came to a halt by the side 
of a brook, held fast by the ice and 
protected by a rankling growth of elder- 
berry, witch-hazel, sassafras, and grape- 
vine. 

The yellow-faced sun was already 
laughing at them over the hill-tops, and 
flinging a crimson glow upon the morn- 
ing sky, the bare tree-tops, and snow- 
laid meadows. 

“Yan, my boy, this be glorious!” 
cried Jacob, placing Yan upon his feet, 
and stretching his arms and chest to 
the keen air. “ See ! to the right there 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 105 

be a weathercock and a Dutch gable 
among the trees. Oh, this be fine ! ” 
and again he stretched his long arms 
to the free air. 

Yan looked at him. His hair was 
unkempt, and blew about his face and 
neck. His face was pallid, and his 
cheeks were so hollow that Nochie’s 
plump fist would scarcely have filled 
them ; he was hatless, and his clothes, 
frozen as stiff as pasteboard, were the 
same jacket and full knickerbockers he 
had worn the day of his capture. 

Yan was more neatly dressed in the 
suit supplied him by the English officer, 
though his queue and hat were much 
awry, and his close jacket and knee- 
breeches were stiff with the frozen sea- 
water. In spite of himself, his teeth 
chattered. 

Jacob looked at him. “ If we had a 


io6 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

little hot breakfast and fire/’ he said, 
“ we would do very well.” 

“ Yes, Mynheer, so we would,” an- 
swered Yan ; “but there comes an old 
man to see why we be trespassing on 
his land. We must get on.” 

“ That we must, if you be strong 
enough for it,” said Jacob; and together 
they sprang across the frozen brook, 
up the bank, and into the woods. 

An hour later, and they ventured to 
emerge from the woods upon the high- 
way. There had evidently been an 
early skirmish there, or perhaps it had 
taken place the evening before. The 
snow was trampled, broken gunstocks 
lay here and there, and a haversack and 
battered canteen lay scattered in the 
road. 

“ May good Saint Nicholas be always 
with us!” exclaimed Jacob, picking up 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 107 

the canteen and haversack. “ Here be 
a mouthful for two big appetites ; ” and 
tearing open the haversack, he handed 
Yan a piece of dried fish and bread, 
while he eagerly munched a mouthful 
or two himself, as they hurried on again. 

It was three o’clock in the afternoon, 
and yet they seemed still far from 
home. Several times had they has- 
tened from the highway into the woods, 
as once they heard a drum and fife, an- 
other time the voices of men, and a third 
and fourth time the discharge of guns. 

“ To-day we must be cowards,” said 
Jacob, more as if talking to himself 
than Yan, “and go skulking through 
the woods but, thank Saint Nicholas, 
it won’t be always so.” 

“ No, no, Mynheer,” said Yan, wearily ; 
“ I be ready to go soldiering whenever 
I be needed.” 


io8 Christmas at T appall Sea. 

“ Wait a bit,” said Jacob ; “ good Saint 
Nicholas be with us again. Do you 
see that sledge and oxen down there 
We will ride a mile or two ; ” and 
down the hill he clambered, Yan doing 
the same. 

They did not stop to see who was 
the owner of the team, nor what had 
become of him ; but seating themselves 
upon the sledge, started the oxen for- 
ward at a brisker pace than they had 
ever travelled. 

Two miles were journeyed over in 
this way, when the oxen stopped at a 
farmhouse-turning. 

“ That is to tell us, this be their home, 
and they will take us no further. It is 
as well ; for walking, if less resting, be 
warmer than riding,” said Jacob; and 
leaving the sledge, he and Yan again 
tramped on. 


XIV. 


^HE sun, which had done his best 
all day to warm and cheer them, 
now dropped out of sight. Jacob and 
Yan swallowed the last crumb of the 
bread and fish, and made ready for the 
last home-pull. 

“You have Saint Nicholas all right?” 
asked Jacob. 

“That I have,” answered Yan, tap- 
ping the front of his jacket. 

“And you feel yourself?” 

“I do,” said Yan, “and not near so 
hard used as this morning.” 

“ Then we will run a bit, — not for 
fear, this time, but to bring us, hearty 
and warm, to a supper of Katrina’s 
cooking.” 


no Christmas at Tappan Sea, 

“Vrouw Van Tassel, with Nochie, 
the Widow Van Wurmer, and Dinah, 
be at the George Washington,” said 
Van. 

“ The George Washington ! ” repeated 
Jacob ; what be that ? ” 

“ The new name for my father’s inn,” 
answered Yan. 

“ And a good name,” said Jacob ; “ but 
why leave they tlieir own ‘ Roost ’ ? ” 

It was a hard piece of news for Yan 
to tell. He had been putting it off all 
day. 

“ The night I was taken,” he said at 
last, “ they burned your house to the 
ground.” 

Jacob stopped short, murmured some- 
thing, and went on again, though he 
stumbled for a few steps. 

“ Father will find us a good meal,” 
Yan tried to say cheerily. 


Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 1 1 1 

“That be so,” said Jacob, straighten- 
ing his shoulders. “All be fair in war, 
and I had given them many a good 
taste of shot from the great goose- 
gun ; ” yet he looked neither east nor 
west, but directly ahead, as, an hour 
later, they passed his ruined home. 
Kind night, too, was casting her mantel 
over the only wall left standing, and 
hiding the charred limbs of the trees 
that were close about it. 

Oloffe Kieft, on the same old bench, 
moved indoors for winter, sat smok- 
ing his long Delft pipe. His hair had 
frosted and his cheeks wrinkled in the 
last seventeen months; still his face 
was as placid as ever. A little dog, 
curled at his feet, sprang up, and began 
barking. Oloffe listened. There were 
footsteps on the porch which he knew. 
He drew his pipe from his mouth, and 


1 1 2 Christmas at Tappan Sea. 

called but one word, — “ Yan ! ” It 
brought the household, with Nochie, 
Vrouw Van Tassel, the Widow Van 
Wurmer, and Dinah. 

The broad front-door was flung open 
by a dozen hands; and Jacob and Yan, 
winking and blinking in the sudden 
shift from darkness to light stood 
among them. 

There was silence, shouts, tears, 
laughter, hand-shakes, and embraces; 
then the worn and weary escapers sank 
upon a settle in the wide hall. 

“You be thin, father! ’’said Nochie, 
sliding her plump arm round his neck. 

“You be grown tall and like the 
Onderdoncks, my whipster,” said Oloffe 
to Yan; “why stayed you so long 
away } ” 

Yan looked at Nochie, while Jacob 
laid his broad hand on Yan’s slim arm. 



“ The broad front door was dung open.” 





























Christmas at Tapp an Sea. 1 1 3 

“Ask him if the good Saint Nicholas 
be safe, Nochie.” 

For answer, Yan took it from his 
jacket, and put it into her hands. 

“ And the file, Yan ? ” she questioned ; 
“ was that of help ? ” 

Her father told her of its hiding-place, 
and, in a few words, of their escape. 

“ That child would go to New York,” 
said the Widow Van Wurmer, coming 
to them with two bowls of broth, al- 
ready warmed, for the wayfarers. “ I 
told her I went but to see father Van 
Wurmer safe buried, and that in these 
times it be no place for children ; still 
she would — ” 

“ Oh, sister Nochie, this be very 
good broth,” interrupted Jacob, setting 
his bowl, quite empty, upon her salver. 

Nochie was too absorbed in her own 
thought to notice her aunt’s words. 

8 


1 14 Christmas at T appall Sea. 

“ Good, good Saint Nicholas,” she 
said, holding him close, “ you have 
brought us all together again, just as I 
asked you. This be a happy, happy 
Christmas Eve.” 

The next day, Christmas, 1776, the 
Battle of Trenton was fought, the “ To- 
ries” “ retreating through New York 
to New Jersey.” 

It is Christmas again. Jacob Van 
Tassel has rebuilt his home, and swung 
from the liooks above the kitchen fire- 
place his great goose-gun. 

Only that summer, Nochie and Yan, 
walking along the Tappan Sea, found 
upon its sands the body of old Pompey 
“ drownded ” indeed, his hands clasping 
the great goose-gun. Was this his act 
of restitution, now that the war was 
over and the “ Whigs” had won 1 


Christmas at Tappan Sea. 1 1 5 

Now, however, the Van Tassel house 
is gayly lighted; even the staid parlor 
is ablaze with candle glory, for it is the 
“ Feast of Saint Nicholas.” 

On the mantel shines their Star of 
Bethlehem, the metal Saint Nicholas. 





STORIES OF 

THREE LITTLE DUTCH CHILDREN 


BY M. CARRIE HYDE 



GOOSTIE. 

UNDER THE STABLE FT.OOR. 

YAN AND NOCHIE OF TAPPAN SEA. 

All three of these stories are delightfully told, and will surely please 
the little folks. — Boston Times. 

Square i6mo. Boards. Illustrated. Each, cents 



THE LITTLE WOMEN SERIES 

BY LOUISA M. ALCOTT 

A//ss Alcott is really a benefactor of hotiseholds. — II. II 



LITTLE WOMEN. 
LITTLE MEN. 

EIGHT COUSINS. 
UNDER THE LILACS. 


AN OLD-FASHIONED GIRL. 
JO’S BOYS. 

ROSE IN BLOOM. 

JACK AND JILL. 


i 6 mo. 


Cloth. 


Illustrated. Each, ^1.50. 
tmiform., in box, $12.00 


Eight volumes. 


MRS. EWING’S FAMOUS STORIES 

We wish that such stories could be placed in the hands of our youngf 
people, instead of the nonsense too often published. Mrs. Ewing evi- 
dently writes because she enjoys it, and has something to say worth saying. 
— Woman's Journal. 



SIX TO SIXTEEN. 

A GREAT EMERGENCY. 
JAN OF THE WINDMILL. 
WE AND THE WORLD. 
JACKANAPES, ETC. 
MELCHIOR’S DREAM, ETC. 


MRS. OVERTHEWAY’S RE- 
MEMBRANCES. 

LOB LIE-BY-THE-FIRE, ETC. 
A FLATIRON FOR A FAR- 
THING. 

LAST WORDS. 


i 6 mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Each., 50 cents. Ten volumes., 
tcnifor?n, in box, $ 5.00 



THE MISS TOOSEY BOOKS 

We wish to condense into as few words as possible unqualified admira- 
tion for two charming little stories, as wholesome and as delightful as any- 
thing of the kind which in a twelvemonth it can possibly fall to our lot to 
criticise. — The Churchman {noHce of Miss Toosey s Mission" and 
“ Laddie" ). 



With illustrations. i 6 mo. Cloth. In uniforin binding. 


BELLE . 

. . . $1.00 

DEAR .... 

$1.00 

TIP CAT . 

. . I .00 

POMONA . 

1.00 

PEN 

. . . 1.00 

MY HONEY . 

1.00 

DON . 

. . 1.00 

OUR LITTLE ANN . 

1.00 

LIL . 

. . . 1.00 

ROSE AND LAVENDER 

1.00 


ROB AND KIT . . $1.00. 



NEW EDITIONS. 

BABY JOHN, ZOE, and FOR THE FOURTH TIME OF 

ASKING gi.oo 

MISS TOOSEY’S MISSION, LADDIE, AND PRIS . i.oo 

The set., 13 volumes., $ 13 . 00 . 

MISS TOOSEY'S MISSION AND LADDIE . . . $.co 
BABY JOHN . $.50 PRIS . $.so ZOE . .^o 

FOR THE FOURTH TIME OF ASKING ... .lo 




$ 

f 


« 



% 


, t » 

> ' ’ - • 







# 

r 


i 



» 




4 




r 4 

I 


i 


0 



Y 


t 




i' r 



t 


t 



I 





t 







I « 



*1 


t 


» 


- f 

\ , *• 


.‘•'ft-' r ■' : ■ ? '■' DL- '/ 

V V . •» s^‘ i \ ‘ t-. V ♦ * 


<c ;v‘; .^, 


w 


■•-, s *• ** 




OCT 7 '1899 








ifl 


r' ' I 










* 7 • ' ' u j* ' 

• 1'. ’• ■'■'5.. ’ 

’,v^,V T ■• '. ' 

^!Jh• •-■^.■•''‘ ■/. j y 'i 


•30 

u J 


V- 


1 .. 


I > 


« 

- \ 


i'r, -. 

k< •■ •, V 

■ .• 

jf'y 


} 

s 

i 


. ^ 'r, 




> ♦ 


VL 
• » ' 


■ ■% , ' 

. • • I 

4 -'.•»'T. •■• 

• ■ . ■* . 


« I 

• / 


, \ 




-■' 

. i». . » 


. *. » 

• ■ v'- 


•> ' 


, V- V 




* ' -■ 


• / 


« 4 • 


Ik f ^ 

V 


J . ^ ■' 


• '* •>' V; 

' A * . 

fi .» 

I 



. . ’f \‘’ ' .'>‘ V . ■^- ' • *^ IQmIBBRI 

<. -> . ‘ iBBa 

^ .& . . '''I'.Cr ; . L . - 


\ ■ 
r 


<v 

I r 


, -v" . • 'V^i*':'*'^ ; ■ 

^ . ‘ ' I ^4 T ‘ > " ‘.‘i 

Ban 


'.- f 


V ' r 


I • 




>• -. 






» # .\ » 




■m&~r- ■ 

- i ^ ■ -TJ . ii -- . \ ^ 

• ’!-■'■• •;./.- . V' 


> - - « ' * : • *■ ■ - ' ‘« '. •Vk.TTF ■ - 

• '. 'S * - 'A. .\. ■ ■-'■■- ^ *■ ■ " ' ’ ^JL 

' ^ V'.- ^ •' ^ . ‘ "ii’vV 

V » ■'' ' • ' •• ■// ... • Wi*./: 


•.' • fir /• 


:r/v 
■ i • • 


^ V 



'• - t • ^ k. ' ' ^ V ■*■ ■ C'. ^ ^ ’ *i4*S* ' L 5 ^ ^ 


, I*' ;C?li 

.' ■ ^- v , ••• ^ ' 




* 'ac-* —^.2 . ' > ■ * ' 

'-■■JS® ''■;■■■ 

• . • - . ''.v^^ ; 

' '" ' ■ -. ..’■- ■' » 

•» • r-4.* w S »•• ‘ ^ 





